The latest developments on the severe storms across the U.S. (all times local):
11:30 p.m.
A Missouri sheriff says four soldiers from another country who were temporarily stationed at Fort Leonard Wood are among the six people who have died in flooding in the state.
Pulaski County Sheriff Ronald Long said in a statement late Sunday night that a witness saw a car drive into a flooded roadway a day earlier. It was swept downstream. First responders found two men inside the sedan who apparently had drowned, and the bodies of two other men who had been in the car were found Sunday.
Long says the victims were “international soldiers” who were temporarily stationed at the central Missouri Army base for training. They were not immediately identified, pending notification of their families by the U.S. State Department, and the statement did not give their nationalities.
A message seeking further information was left with the base’s media affairs department.
Long says it’s possible that a fifth person was in the car because an acquaintance of the soldiers’ is missing.
The statement says the other two people who died in flooding were the occupants of a vehicle that tried to cross a flooded road.
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9:30 p.m.
The National Weather Service says strong weekend storms produced nine tornadoes across North Texas.
The Dallas/Fort Worth forecast office issued a statement Sunday night confirming that nine tornadoes ranging from an EF-0 to an EF-4 touched down a night earlier. Eleven people were killed.
The Weather Service says not all the tornado damage has been examined and additional surveys are planned Monday. It says the number of tornadoes may go up.
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7:15 p.m.
Authorities surveying damage from tornadoes in North Texas say there may be as many as 600 homes with damage in the Dallas suburb of Rowlett.
Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins said in a statement Sunday evening that damage figures could change. He says assessments are ongoing but have been delayed due to rain.
The new figure brings the total estimate of damaged homes in Texas to as many as 1,450.
A 24-hour curfew has been established for Rowlett in the affected areas. Jenkins’ statement says only residents and emergency personnel will be allowed access.
Nearby Garland was also hit by a tornado that killed eight people and left 15 injured. Police there said in a Sunday night statement that an initial search of impacted areas had concluded with no additional victims found.
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7 p.m.
Oklahoma’s emergency management officials say hospitals are reporting that eight people have suffered storm-related injuries as severe weather and a blizzard pound the state. The nature of the injuries wasn’t immediately known.
The Emergency Management Department says that as snow and high winds hammer western Oklahoma, warming stations have been set up at churches and other locations. The state Corporation Commission says 60,000 homes and businesses have lost electricity.
Travel is discouraged. Roads are slick and plunging temperatures will turn any water remaining on the roads into ice in western Oklahoma.
Officials in Altus, in the southwest corner of the state, have asked people to conserve water because of a power outage at a reservoir.
Counties statewide are reporting flooding from heavy rains.
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6:30 p.m.
Officials in southern Arkansas say it appears a tornado touched down in Bearden as a severe weather system rolled into the region.
There were no reports of injuries after the storm struck Sunday afternoon. Ouachita (WASH-ih-taw) CountySheriff David Norwood told the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette newspaper that a twister appeared to touch down in a four-block area along Main Street. He said the storm took roofs off buildings, uprooted trees and shattered storefront windows.
Norwood said streets into the area have been blocked to keep out looters.
Little Rock television station KATV reported that damage was also reported in Nevada County in southern Arkansas, also near Hampton, and television station KTHV reported that emergency workers had to rescue a number of people from water after heavy rains inundated northern Arkansas.
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6 p.m.
Missouri’s governor has declared a state of emergency because of widespread flooding that has led to at least eight fatalities.
Gov. Jay Nixon’s office said in a release Sunday that weekend flooding has led to eight deaths, dozens of water rescues and evacuations. More flooding is expected while river levels continue rising around the state.
Several roadways have also been closed because of flooding, including a section of Interstate 70 outside St. Louis.
Nixon says the state’s emergency plan has been activated, allowing state agencies to coordinate with local authorities to provide emergency services.
In Pulaski County, authorities said six people died after vehicles they were in were swept away by floodwaters. Greene County authorities also said two fatalities there were associated with the recent flooding.
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5 p.m.
Nearly all of Interstate 40 in Texas, the main east-west highway through the state’s Panhandle, has been shut because of a snowstorm pummeling the area.
The Texas Department of Public Safety says only a small section of the highway within Amarillo remains open. Otherwise, nearly all the 178-mile stretch is shut down.
The section west of Amarillo was closed earlier Sunday. Texas State Trooper Cindy Barkley said Sunday evening that deteriorating conditions have forced authorities to also indefinitely close the highway for about 100 miles east of Amarillo to Oklahoma.
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4:40 p.m.
Reports from local officials show as many as 1,000 homes in the Dallas area were damaged or destroyed by tornadoes and heavy storms that killed at least 11 people.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott and other state officials on Sunday would not commit to an estimated number of buildings destroyed, families displaced or even casualties. They cautioned that rescue teams are still assessing the damage and sifting through toppled structures.
But numbers reported by local officials suggest a grim tally of destruction. The worst hit was Garland, where meteorologists say a powerful EF-4 tornado tore through the suburb. Wind gusts for tornadoes on that scale exceed 200 mph.
At least 600 homes were damaged in Garland and more than 100 were impacted farther to the south in EllisCounty.
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3:45 p.m.
Garland Mayor Douglas Athas says on his official Facebook page that search teams are still looking through the rubble from an EF-4 tornado.
He said Sunday that search teams would work until they check every building and car. Utility crews were also working to restore power, and about 40 people remained in an emergency shelter.
Athas said he was proud of the city’s “preparedness” and its emergency personnel. He also thanked everyone who'd offered to volunteer and donate.
Officials have said 11 people died in the tornado in Garland, a large suburb of Dallas, and 15 people were injured.
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3:35 p.m.
Authorities in south-central Missouri say at least seven people have died due to flooding.
Pulaski County Sheriff Ronald Long said Sunday that six people died in two separate overnight incidents when two cars drove into flooded roadways.
The Missouri State Highway Patrol told KYTV that authorities recovered the body of a driver from a creek in Greene County in southwest Missouri on Sunday.
Also in the southwest part of the state, Barry County emergency officials say crews rescued people from 29 vehicles stranded by rising waters, and several other people had to be evacuated from homes.
The National Weather Service issued flash flood warnings Sunday for much of Missouri, where three to six inches of rain fell during the weekend, and up to four inches more of rain was expected through Monday.
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3:30 p.m.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott is warning that the number of victims from a deadly outbreak of storms and tornadoes in the Dallas area could still rise.
Abbott made disaster declarations for four counties on Sunday following the severe weather that killed at least 11 people. He said there have been reports of as many as a dozen tornadoes around North Texas, but meteorologists were still working to confirm how many touched down.
Abbott said the state was not yet committing to a total number of casualties because rescue crews were still searching through rubble and destroyed homes.
He declared disasters in Dallas, Collin, Rockwall and Ellis counties and warned that roads across Texas remain in “perilous” condition because of plunging temperatures and continuing rainfall.
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2:20 p.m.
Oklahoma is seeing a range of precipitation, from blowing and drifting snow in the Panhandle to heavy, flood-inducing rains in the east part of the state.
National Weather Service meteorologist Jonathan Kurtz said it’s hard to measure how much snow has fallen in the Panhandle because of 40 to 60 mph winds. That’s causing 1- to 2-foot snow drifts, even with a couple inches of snow on the ground.
In central Oklahoma, including Oklahoma City, a mixture of rain, sleet and freezing rain tapered off Sunday afternoon. But Kurtz said up to four inches of snow was in the forecast for Monday.
Eastern Oklahoma saw heavy rainfall and flooding. At least 11 counties had roads and bridges that were closed due to flooding. The far northeastern Oklahoma town of Tahlequah had logged more than 9 inches of rainfall.
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2:15 p.m.
The body of a motorist has been found in a water-swollen creek in southwestern Missouri.
KYTV (http://bit.ly/22tL9Oy ) reports that authorities recovered the body of a driver from a creek in GreeneCounty. Officials haven’t released the person’s identity or circumstances of the death.
The National Weather Service issued flash flood warnings on Sunday for eastern, central and southwest Missouri, where three to six inches of rain fell during the weekend, and up to four inches more of rain was expected through Monday.
The Missouri Department of Transportation reports an eastbound section of I-70 in St. Charles County and several other roadways around the state were closed because of flooding.
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2:05 p.m.
The Texas Department of Public Safety in Amarillo is strongly discouraging all travel throughout the entire Texas Panhandle because blowing and drifting snow had made the roads impassable. That’s a 26-county area covering nearly 26,000 square miles.
Trooper Cindy Barkley said more than 20 motorists have been stranded by 8- to 10-foot-high snow drifts along highways U.S. 60 and U.S. 70 in Parmer County. The county is about 80 miles southwest of Amarillo along the Texas-New Mexico state line.
She said crews are trying to plow the roads but the blowing snow is making the job difficult.
Authorities also say Interstate 40 west of Amarillo for about 50 miles to the New Mexico border will remain closed through the night.
New Mexico’s governor declared a state of emergency because of impassable roads. Roswell received between 14 and 18 inches of snow since Saturday afternoon, and 8 more inches were forecast.
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1:25 p.m.
Authorities in Alabama are attributing a second death in the state to severe weather that struck the Southeast last week.
Coffee County Coroner Robert Preachers says the body of a 22-year-old man was discovered Sunday morning. That man and a 5-year-old boy were in a vehicle that was swept away while attempting to cross a bridge near Jack, Alabama.
Preachers said the body of the boy was found Saturday.
WTVM-TV reports that four individuals from the same vehicle were rescued earlier in the same area.
The discovery raises the death toll in the Southeast from recent storms to 19. Ten people died in Mississippi, and six died in Tennessee. One person was killed in Arkansas.
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1:15 p.m.
Heavy rain has pushed creeks and rivers out of their banks in Missouri, forcing closures of several roadways, including a portion of Interstate 70.
The National Weather Service issued flash flood warnings Sunday for sections of eastern, central and southwest Missouri, where three to six inches of rain fell during the weekend, and up to four inches more of rain was expected through Monday.
The Missouri Department of Transportation reported on its website that an eastbound section of I-70 in St. Charles County was closed Sunday afternoon because of water over the roadway. The department says several county roads were also closed because of flooding.
Earlier in the day on I-70 outside of St. Louis, vehicles were backed up for miles as motorists eased their way through high water.
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12:35 p.m.
Whiteout conditions and snow drifts have closed some highways in the Texas Panhandle, while historic snowfall totals are expected in nearby New Mexico.
Texas Department of Transportation spokesman Paul Braun tells the Amarillo Globe-News that crews are doing what they can to plow the drifts, but that they “go through and it blows it right back.”
Parts of Interstate 40 west of Amarillo, Texas, and into Santa Rosa, New Mexico, were shut Sunday. Nearly 10,000 Excel Energy customers, most of them Amarillo, have been without power. High winds are blamed for knocking over utility poles and power lines.
Amarillo received only about 3 inches of snow overnight but high winds have caused 3- to 4-foot drifts. Forecasts are calling for another 4 to 8 inches of snow and winds gusting to 50 miles an hour. Albuquerque, New Mexico, has received about 6 inches of snow.
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12:05 p.m.
Forecasters say two tornadoes that hit the Dallas area had winds up to more than 200 mph.
National Weather Service teams are still surveying damage from Saturday’s storms that left at least 11 people dead and injured dozens.
The weather service said the tornado in the suburb of Garland has been rated an EF-4. That’s the second-most powerful tornado on the damage scale used by meteorologists and is generally strong enough to level well-constructed homes and toss cars.
Authorities in Garland say at least eight people were killed in 15 injured in storms on Saturday night. About 600 homes were also destroyed.
The weather service also said damage in nearby Rowlett indicated it was likely an EF-3 tornado, which has winds up to 165 mph. City officials said 23 people were injured by the storm.
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11:25 a.m.
A southern Illinois coroner says three adults and two children have drowned after the vehicle they were riding in was swept away and sank in a rain-swollen creek.
Marion County Coroner Troy Cannon says the swift moving East Fork Creek carried the car off a low-water bridge about 7:30 p.m. Saturday near the town of Patoka, about 60 miles east of St. Louis.
The car became lodged 150 to 200 feet downstream, but shortly after the first firefighter arrived on the scene it was dislodged and sank.
Cannon says dive teams recovered the car from the water several hours later and the bodies of the victims from the car.
The names of the victims were not immediately released. Cannon says the vehicle was traveling from Kentucky to Minnesota.
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11:20 a.m.
Witnesses say drivers appeared to abandon their cars along a Texas interstate where authorities say a tornado thrashed an area of 2 square miles outside Dallas and left at least three people dead.
Zach Shirley said Sunday that bumper-to-bumper traffic clogged Interstate 30 near an intersection where police say some cars appeared to be thrown from the road.
The 34-year-old said he spent nearly eight hours on the interstate, on which he got on after the tornado, and considered leaving his car and walking to his apartment.
Shirley said he was humbled to find out that where he lived was spared.
At least 11 people died in severe weather that damaged hundreds of homes around Dallas and shut down roads the day after Christmas.
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10:55 a.m.
Forecasters say the threat of severe weather is likely over for the Dallas area, where at least 11 people were killed from storms that spawned tornadoes and wreaked havoc on roadways.
National Weather Service meteorologist Matt Bishop said Sunday that more rain and plunging temperatures are on the way. A slow-moving cold front could also bring flooding and damaging winds farther east of the overnight destruction that knocked out power to thousands and crumpled hundreds of homes.
Forecasters say the weekend storms put the annual rainfall at DFW International Airport above five feet for the first time in recorded history.
Two survey teams were headed out Sunday to assess the strength and number of tornadoes that socked the area Saturday night.
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9 a.m.
New Mexico residents are dealing with a snowstorm that has crippled parts of the state and caused traffic accidents and road closures.
In Albuquerque, police say officers responded to 178 weather-related accidents by 9:30 p.m. Saturday. About 58 involved people with injuries.
Officials also shut down a stretch of Interstate 40 leading to the Texas border because of hazardous driving conditions.
Police spokesman Fred Duran says hotels along I-40 were full and had to turn people away.
The National Weather Service says it is expecting historic snowfall totals and that snow drifts more than 7 feet high have been reported.
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9:30 a.m.
A neighborhood in a community northeast of Dallas where 23 people were injured is cleaning up from an apparent tornado.
Dale Vermurlen lives in a Rowlett neighborhood that sustained heavy damage. His house only had minor damage, but was next to that were flattened.
He said he rode out the storm with his two dogs in the bathroom.
Homes in the neighborhood that had been searched by emergency responders were marked with a black “X.” State troopers had blocked off roads, utility crews were restoring power and people were walking around, hushed and dazed.
Rowlett has a 24-hour curfew in the affected areas, which Thunderberg says took a direct hit from the tornado.
At least 11 people died during the storms, but no deaths were reported in Rowlett.
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8:55 a.m.
National Weather Service survey teams are heading out to the Dallas suburbs where tornadoes and strong storms that killed at least 11 people left widespread destruction.
Meteorologist Matt Bishop at the weather service’s Fort Worth office says he believes there were multiple twisters but the number and strength aren’t known yet. Teams have gathered in the continuing thunderstorms and rain.
Bishop says the tornado outbreak at this time of the year for North Texas occurs “from time to time ... but it’s certainly not something that happens regularly.”
In far West Texas, up to four inches of snow has fallen overnight in the Alpine area, with foot-deep drifts reported.
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7:35 a.m.
Garland Police Lt. Pedro Barineau said at least three people who died were found in vehicles.
He also said that some cars appeared to be thrown from Interstate 30 and George Bush Turnpike when the tornado hit about 6:45 p.m. Saturday. It wasn’t known whether that was the case for the people found in the vehicles.
Eight people died and 15 were injured in Garland, which is about 20 miles northeast of Dallas. That death toll went up by three since Saturday night.
About 600 structures were damaged, the majority of which were single-family homes. Barineau said that it’s “total devastation.”
At least 11 people have died in Texas due to the storms.
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7:15 a.m.
Eight people have died and 15 people were injured in Garland in a destructive tornado.
Garland Police Lt. Pedro Barineau said in a Sunday morning news conference that the death toll rose by three people since Saturday night, when a tornado struck.
He said about 600 structures were damaged, the majority of which were single-family homes.
He said that they’re still addressing the total amount of damage.
Barineau said the tornado’s path was 2 square miles.
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7:05 a.m.
Rowlett City Manager Brian Funderburk says 23 people were injured and “huge amounts of damage” from a tornado is widespread but concentrated in southern part of the city.
Rowlett has a 24-hour curfew in the affected areas, which Thunderberg says took a direct hit from the tornado. It isn’t known the strength of the tornado’s winds.
The extent of the injuries are not known, and officials said there are no reports of missing people.
Rowlett is about 20 miles northeast of Dallas.
Officials also say there were reports of looting overnight.
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6:08 a.m.
A fifth person has been confirmed dead in vehicle accidents near the intersection of two major highways in Garland, east of Dallas.
Officer Joe Harn, a Garland police spokesman, said Sunday morning the five were killed in accidents that occurred during a massive storm, but it’s unclear if all five were in the same vehicle or how they died.
A tornado is reported to have gone through the suburb east of Dallas, damaging several homes.
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11:15 p.m.
Three more people are confirmed dead from the storms near Dallas, the latest fatalities located in CollinCounty.
Sheriff’s Deputy Chris Havey gave no other details of the deaths.
Collin County is about 45 miles northeast of Dallas.
The fatalities in Collin County bring to seven the number of confirmed deaths from a series of storms that spawned tornadoes after dark on Saturday evening.
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9:30 p.m.
Four people are confirmed killed in vehicle accidents near the intersection of two major highways in Garland, east of Dallas.
Officer Joe Harn, a Garland police spokesman, said Saturday night the four were killed in accidents that occurred during a massive storm, but it’s unclear if all four were in the same vehicle or how they died.
A tornado is reported to have gone through the suburb east of Dallas, damaging several homes.
Harn says there are no active rescues underway, though first responders continue to search houses for anyone trapped after the storms passed.
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8:30 p.m.
An official with the Dallas County Sheriff’s office says deputies are responding to damages caused by a tornado east of Dallas, including a trailer park ablaze.
Spokeswoman Melinda Urbina said while several emergency teams had been dispatched to Sunnyvale, just east of the Dallas city limits, following reports of trailers on fire and possible injuries in a mobile home park.
Urbina said the extent of the damage was still uncertain but that nearby roads had been shut due to debris and that the damage to the homes was likely extensive enough to render some “inhabitable.” The Red Cross was also responding to the scene, she said, and trees were down.
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7:05 p.m.
The emergency manager for a county south of Dallas says some homes have been destroyed and damaged during a fierce storm that spawned tornadoes in the area.
Stephanie Parker is the emergency manager for Ellis County, which is about 30 miles south of Dallas. She posted on twitter: “We have destroyed and damaged homes. Please do not get out on the roads if you do not have to.”
The National Weather Service in Fort Worth confirmed that a tornado touched down south of Dallas earlier this evening. No other details of damage were immediately available.
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6:30 p.m.
The National Weather Service says a tornado was on the ground south of Dallas.
There were no immediate reports of damage, but National Weather Service Meteorologist Anthony Bain in Fort Worth says that the tornado was confirmed by numerous people on the ground and with video. It was located near the town of Duncanville around Interstate 20.
The tornado’s trajectory was headed toward downtown Dallas but WFAA television said that it appeared to have lifted off the ground at it moved north.
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6:10 p.m.
The National Weather Service says the Dallas area is under a tornado warning until 6:45 p.m.
An Associated Press reporter says warning sirens went off in the downtown area of Dallas.
At Love Field, a major airport in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, the public address system warned people to move away from windows in the concourse area.
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4:30 p.m.
Inmates from an Alabama correctional facility were evacuated as a precaution to potential flooding caused by the recent heavy rainfall.
Alabama Department of Corrections spokesman Bob Horton says 336 inmates were evacuated from the Red Eagle Community Work Center around 12:30 a.m. Saturday. Horton says the inmates were cooperative and moved to three state correctional facilities in Elmore County.
Red Eagle is a minimum security correctional facility and is located three miles north of Montgomery near the Tallapoosa River.
The National Weather Service says the river had exceeded a flood stage of 25 feet to 33.5 feet by 8 a.m. Saturday. The NWS has extended the flood warning for the area until Monday afternoon.
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4 p.m.
Alabama Gov. Robert Bentley praised efforts to restore and improve the levee system while touring the town of Elba, which was affected by flooding.
Bentley visited the town in southern Alabama on Saturday and stopped in at Elba Elementary, where people had taken shelter from the flood waters. He says the levees are expected to withstand the river crest.
The tiny, flood-prone Alabama town was underwater in 1929, which led to the constructions of levees for protection. The city flooded again in 1990 when rising waters overwhelmed levees and again in 1998 when a levee failed under pressure from flood waters.
Bentley declared a state of emergency Friday amid widespread flash flooding that follows several days of intense weather throughout the Southeast.
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1:30 p.m.
Mississippi’s death toll from this week’s storms has climbed to 10.
Mississippi Emergency Management Agency spokesman Greg Flynn confirms two bodies were found Saturday morning in Benton County. He says the bodies were those of two people authorities had been searching for since tornadoes touched down Wednesday.
Further details on where or how the bodies were discovered were not immediately available.
Unseasonably warm temperatures across the southeastern U.S. this week spawned severe weather blamed for deaths in Mississippi, Alabama and Arkansas. A total of 17 people have been killed.
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1 p.m.
Volunteers are distributing sandbags in the town of Elba, Alabama, as flooding remained a major concern after severe storms battered the state.
James Brown of the Coffee County Emergency Management Agency says volunteers distributed sandbags in Elba, where the Pea River was projected to crest Saturday at 43 feet, about a foot below the levees that protect the area.
Brown says while that height was much too for much comfort, so far the levees were holding.
Emergency officials issued a voluntary evacuation order for the flood-prone community.
About 17 people took safety in a county shelter. Brown said that, according to estimates, more than 100 structures appear to have water damage.
Gov. Robert Bentley will tour the area later in the day.
